


Shallow Cuts

by skybound2



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Angst, Drama, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-03-16
Updated: 2004-03-16
Packaged: 2017-10-10 18:55:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 276
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/103047
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/skybound2/pseuds/skybound2
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dawn's point of view during the platform scene  in "The Gift"</p>
            </blockquote>





	Shallow Cuts

**Author's Note:**

> **Spoilers: **Through Episode 5x22, "The Gift" of BTVS  
> **Disclaimer:** All hail Joss  
> 

_Shallow cuts, shallow cuts._

The strange mantra had reverberated around in her mind as she had oh-so-slowly dug the blade into the flesh of her forearm. Warning her. Reminding her. _Never too deep. Just enough to bleed and bleed and…_

Now, standing on this platform, the voice of the demon in front of her burns her ears:

"Shallow cuts, shallow cuts…"

The inner voice she had heard so often in her dreams suddenly belongs to the creepy little man before her. A metallic tinge echoes through the eerie quiet that has settled between her and her captor. Blood. Her blood. Drip, drip, dripping onto this haphazard contraption she is lashed to; until it is the only thing that is real.

Tears streak her porcelain face in tandem with the blood flowing in soft rivers down her thighs. She doesn't cry because of the pain, she cries because she finally understands. Nothing she ever did really mattered. She never had a choice.

Tantrums thrown. Gossip told. Diaries kept. Diaries burned. It all added up to nothing. She's nothing. She isn't real.

She never was.

So when Buffy kisses Dawn goodbye, throws herself into the rising sun, like some cowboy who got it wrong, Dawn's body goes numb.

Another choice made for her. For one moment, just one moment in all her existence; whether eons, fifteen years, or six months, the choice had been hers. She'd been ready. She'd been sure.

She'd been refused.

Now, standing toe to toe with the sun as her tear soaked blood congeals by her feet, dark hair whipping around her face to sting her eyes, it's time to make another choice.

~End


End file.
